Reflect
by webofdreams89
Summary: What kind of father raised his children to be soldiers? John-centric. No pairings.


**Author's Notes: This is just a little plotline that had been bouncing around my skull for a few days before I finally sat down and wrote it a few days ago. Enjoy!**

**Summary: What kind of father raised his children to be soldiers? John-centric. No pairings.**

Reflect

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Sometimes, when John Winchester is in the bathroom, he can not bring himself to look in the mirror. Looking in the mirror means that he will see the lines that have begun to take hold upon his face. John Winchester is not a vane man. He could personally care less how he looks to others. But those lines, frown lines, stress lines, worry lines, they remind him of the fact that he never smiles.

He is a father to two young, wonderful sons. He should have every reason in the world to smile at them, to be proud of their accomplishments. But it is rare that he even finds the strength to spare a passing grin for his oldest, the one who keeps them a family, let alone his youngest who is still wide-eyed and optimistic and barely over the age of nine.

Today, John Winchester forces himself to look into the mirror of the crappy motel bathroom they will be staying in until morning. At first, he avoids even his own reflecting eyes, but when he finally catches them, holds them, the only thing reflecting back at him are the cold eyes of a broken man.

After months of training, John decided that it was time to bring little Sammy along for his first hunt. Dean was against it, John could see it written across his young face, but he knew better than to defy his father's orders. He knew Dean didn't think Sammy was ready and, although John was not eager to shatter what ever innocence still remained in his younger son, he knew that he needed to prepare him.

The case was supposed to a low level one, a spirit that wasn't particularly angry, just mischievous, haunting a long abandoned house. It didn't take long for John to discover that this was not just your typical case.

Sure, when they arrived, they found your average Casper, found the fella's bones in the room he had died in more than fifty years before. And sure, they salted the bones, burned them and sent Casper with a one-way ticket to Where-ever Land.

John had even let Sammy drop the match on the bones and his son had looked so proud when his older brother told him he had done a good job. Case closed, right?

Wrong.

Casper the-not-so-friendly-but-not-particularly-malicious ghost was not the only thing taking residence within the abandoned house. Just as they were about to leave, they other inhabitant came home to find three strangers destroying his only friend.

He was tall, he was massive, but he was also human. As far as John could tell, the newcomer couldn't speak and had probably been without human contact for so long that he had lost whatever humanity he'd had.

John told his boys to go to the car. Dean was thirteen, but he knew how to drive it. John told them to get back to the hotel and to call Bobby or Pastor Jim or someone. Dean began to move, trying to coax his brother to follow, but Sammy stood rooted to the spot, staring as a stranger wrestled his dad to the ground and put hands on his throat.

"C'mon Sammy!" Dean had screamed at him, attempting to grab Sam's arm and yank him to the car if he had to.

Sammy was small though, and quick, jumping out of Dean's reach and lifting his baggy flannel jacket. From the waist of his jeans, Sam withdrew a gun and aimed it at the man. Dean stopped, frozen, a thousand questions popping into his mind all at once. _Where had Sam gotten the gun? Why couldn't Dean move to take it from him, he might hurt himself. Why didn't he have a gun on him to do what Sammy shouldn't have to do?_

The recluse looked up at Sammy, preparing to launch himself at the boy when Sammy flicked off the safety as if he had done it a thousand times before and fired once, twice, three times and the man fell back, landing on John's legs. John quickly pushed free, struggling for air and clutching his bruised neck and as he stood up, he saw that there were tears streaming from his younger son's face.

Dean finally found the will to move, yanking the still smoking gun from Sammy's hands and flicking the safety back into place. He handed the gun to his dad and watched as Sammy, as if in a trance, stepped toward the immobile man that now lay on the ground. Blood was gushing from three close contact holes in the man's chest and stomach and a pool was beginning to gather on the floor.

Sammy stared down at the man until the blood was threatening to reach his feet. John picked his small son up then, carrying him out of the house as Dean followed. Sammy looked at his dad then, his green eyes wide and still streaming, and asked, "I did good, didn't I Dad? I killed a monster?"

John couldn't bring himself to tell Sam that it wasn't really a monster Sammy had killed but a man who was a product of society, of insanity, of _something_. Instead, he just took a deep breath and said "Yeah, Sammy, you did real good. You killed a monster and saved so many people's lives. You saved my life, Sammy."

Sam stared back a moment before laying his head on John's shoulder and saying, "Good. I don't want a monster to ever get you or Dean. I'll kill all the monsters if I have too."

John shuddered, knowing that, despite the fact that Sam had saved his life, it had been such a mistake to bring him.

And later, as John continued to stare into his own reflection, he couldn't help thinking what kind of person he was. What kind of father raised his children to be soldiers? What kind of father subjected them to a such a life?

A knock issued from the other side of the bathroom door. "Dad?" It was Sammy and even still, John could not get the tears streaming from Sammy's eyes from his mind.

"Yeah Sammy?" he called out.

He heard Sam open the door, his still so small voice saying, "Uncle Bobby is on the phone. He says that he's got a big case in the next town over for us."

_For us._ John nearly put his fist through the mirror at how much it cost him to hear his little Sammy say that.

Instead, he cleared his throat and said, "Okay Sammy, tell Bobby I'll call him back in a few minutes, okay?"

"Okay," Sammy said before backing out of the bathroom and closing the door.

After a minute, John looked back into the mirror and said, "God Mary, I can't imagine what you must think of me now."

Quickly, he regained his composure before stepping out of the bathroom and quietly closing the door. He wouldn't call Bobby back until he knew his sons were asleep. He would leave them a note and some cash to get by for a few days and then, in the dead of night, he would leave to hunt down some evil son of a bitch.

_End._


End file.
